Christmas Eve with the Hotchners
by jekkah
Summary: The Hotchners spend their second Christmas Eve together. Very light M rating. Written for AgentNoSmile as part of the 2013 Criminal Minds Christmas Fic Gift Exchange


_Author's Note: This was written for **AgentNoSmile** as part of the 2013 Christmas Fic Exchange. Her requested pairing was Hotch/Reid (romance) and her prompts were "All I want for Christmas is You", mistletoe, shared Christmas-themed dessert, and a surprising gift. I think I managed to get all of the prompts into the story. Happy Holiday, **AgentNoSmile**! Hope you enjoy!_

**Christmas Eve with the Hotchners**

Hotch sighed with a grin as he left Jack's room. It had taken five stories and two long chats to get him to go to sleep. Hotch could hardly believe that, at ten-years-old, Jack had needed so much encouragement to go to sleep, but he supposed it was a special case. Not only was it their first Christmas with Hotch's new spouse, it was their last Christmas with Jack as their only child as their daughter was due in less than a month.

With thoughts of next Christmas dancing in his head, Hotch headed to the living room. He leaned against the doorway, watching his love dance around the room as he gathered bows, wrapping paper, and tape. Hotch chuckled as he realized that, in addition to dancing, Reid was singing "All I Want for Christmas is You."

"- is you, baby!" Reid crooned, shaking his butt. He was completely lost in the song.

"I didn't know that you knew this song," Hotch commented, causing Reid to jump.

Reid shrugged. "Jack's been teaching me all about Christmas. It seems that he was a bit appalled that we didn't really celebrate the holiday growing up and has taken it upon himself to teach me all the 'really fun things about Christmas'. I guess he overlooked my lack of Christmas knowledge last year."

Hotch pushed himself off of the doorway and further into the living room. "What sort of things has he been teaching you?"

"Oh, singing and dancing, baking cookies, watching Christmas specials."

"And where was I during all of this?" Hotch asked with a chuckle.

Reid cast his eyes downward. "Working... or fussing over JJ."

Hotch sighed. JJ was a sticking point in an otherwise amazing relationship. Hotch had wanted to use JJ as their egg donor after she offered, but Reid had been adamantly opposed. If he was to be the biological father, and they both readily agreed that he would, then he wanted someone as close in looks to Hotch as possible and chose Prentiss as he wanted someone that he was acquainted with to be their child's biological mother. But Prentiss had come with her own request: she wanted to be a mother in her own right. So, Reid and Prentiss made a deal where they split the fertilized eggs. Hotch wasn't overly thrilled with the arrangement, but he couldn't deny that it brought joy to Prentiss in addition to themselves. JJ agreed to carry their baby so that Prentiss didn't have to wait to get pregnant herself.

"I wasn't fussing over JJ," Hotch grumbled. "I was making sure that she was comfortable. She _is_ carrying our daughter after all."

"And you don't think she's taking just a little bit advantage of that?" Reid asked. He had a bit of a twinkle in his eye as he continued, "I mean, she _did_ have you baking a cake at three in the morning last week."

Hotch's dark eyes lit up. "Speaking of dessert..." His voice trailed off as he left the room, returning a few minutes later with a small white box. "I picked these up on my way home."

Reid grabbed the box carefully and peered inside. Within the box were half a dozen Santa strawberries. The strawberries were cut in two towards the top and filled with cream cheese, which was then decorated with tiny black chocolate eyes. The tops of the strawberries made for the Santa hats with a bit of the cream cheese on the top in a ball.

"Oh, these are adorable!" Reid exclaimed. He grabbed one and took a bite of it. His eyes rolled in the back of his head. "They are amazing! Oh, but they would be perfect with a little bit of chocolate sauce."

"Like this?" Hotch pulled out a bottle of Hersey's chocolate syrup from behind his back. He laughed when Reid's eyes widened. "Here, allow me." Hotch moved towards Reid's strawberry only to veer off at the last second and pour the syrup into his mouth and over his lips.

Reid gasped, hardening instantly. He placed the box on the coffee table and took another bite of the strawberry in his hand. He ran his hand up Hotch's neck to grip the back of Hotch's head. Reid covered Hotch's mouth with his own, wasting no time in pushing his tongue into Hotch's mouth. The explosion of chocolate, strawberry, and cream cheese flavors combined with the pure taste of Hotch caused Reid to go weak in the knees.

Letting the strawberry fall to the floor, Reid pushed at Hotch's shoulders. Hotch walked backwards until his legs hit the couch. He allowed Reid to shove him onto the couch, but kept his hands around Reid's waist to bring him down as well. Their kisses grew deeper and more desperate.

"Oh God!" Reid moaned, moving from Hotch's mouth down his neck. "I feel like I haven't been able to touch you like this in weeks."

"You haven't," Hotch agreed. He cupped Reid's ass to ground their erections together, reveling in the friction it caused.

Reid removed Hotch's tie and unbuttoned the buttons on his white shirt, nipping Hotch's chest as he went. "We have to agree not to let ourselves go this long without making love again."

Hotch chuckled. "We're going to have a newborn in the house soon. We're going to be lucky to give each other a good night kiss."

"Maybe we should stock up on some mis-" Reid stopped as he pulled down Hotch's black dress pants to reveal red boxers with a strategically placed mistletoe in the front center. "Mistletoe."

"Oh, I think that's an excellent idea," Hotch assured him. "You do know what to do with mistletoe, right?"

"Shut up," Reid muttered before lowering his mouth to Hotch's body.

It was over an hour later when they lay under the Christmas tree in each other's arms. Hotch once again donned the mistletoe boxers while Reid covered himself only in Hotch's white dress shirt. Sweat covered both of their chests.

Reid kissed Hotch's nipple, running his tongue of the tip. "I think we definitely need to include that in our new holiday traditions."

Nodding, Hotch sat up. "But, for now, we really should get the rest of these gifts wrapped."

"Do you think Jack's okay with me being the one to stay home with the kids after the baby comes?" Reid asked, settling down at the coffee table to wrap more gifts.

"He hasn't said anything to me about it," Hotch replied with a shrug, "but, honestly, you've been spending more time with him lately, what do you think?"

Reid fiddled nervously with the bow in his hands. "I think he's fine with it, but that actually brings me to something else that I want to talk to you about."

Hotch bit back a sigh. "What?"

"You've been working a lot lately. We, Jack and I, have hardly seen you. We miss you. Things just aren't the same around here without you."

"I know. I-" Hotch cleared his throat. "I was going to wait until tomorrow to tell you this, but I guess I'll go ahead and give you your gift now. The reason that I've been working so hard lately is that I'm retiring from the BAU in three months and letting Morgan take over as Unit Chief."

Reid's jaw dropped. "But the BAU is your life."

Hotch shook his head. "You – you, Jack, and this new baby are my life. I'm not going to make the same mistakes that I made before. I'm putting my family first this time. I'm still going to work for the FBI, but as an instructor at the academy, and occasionally as a consultant to the BAU. That means that I will be able to be home for dinner nearly every night."

"This is amazing," Reid gushed. "This is the best gift that you could have given me and our kids."

"I'm glad you think so," Hotch grinned. "Mostly, I'm glad that I was finally able to keep a gift a surprise for you!"

Reid waggled his eyebrows. "The boxers were a surprise, too."

Hotch glanced down at them, his face turning three shades of red. "That's because I bought them on my way home." He added another wrapped present to Jack's ever-growing pile. "So, you really are happy about this?"

"Yes, Aaron, I am." Reid laid down the scissors in his hand to grab Hotch's hand. "Honestly, I was starting to feel a bit guilty about both of us remaining in the BAU after the baby was born. It's hard enough with Jack, but at least, he has Jessica and his routine."

"I love you."

Reid grinned, his entire body flushing. "I love you, too. Now, get to wrapping. If I remember correctly, Jack told me that it's customary to wake up before dawn to open gifts. He was being nice to me last year because it was our first Christmas together."

Hotch groaned. "Well, I suppose it will be good practice for the baby."

"Indeed." Reid started on another gift. "Besides, the quicker we get this done, the quicker you'll get to see just where I hid the mistletoe that I got."

Hotch couldn't remember wrapping gifts as fast as he did that night.

END


End file.
